Global Journal of HUMAN-SOCIAL SCIENCE: G
Linguistics & Education
Volume 14 Issue 7 Version 1.0 Year 2014
Type: Double Blind Peer Reviewed International Research Journal
Publisher: Global Journals Inc. (USA)
Online ISSN: 2249-460x & Print ISSN: 0975-587X
Dictionary and Culture: Theory and Practice of the Kola Saami
Dictionary Making
By Ivanishcheva Olga
Murmansk State Humanities University, Russian Federation
Abstract- This paper reports theoretical results obtained in the process of making dictionaries of
the spiritual and material culture lexis of an indigenous small-numbered people of the North – the
Saami. The article shows that such dictionaries are of a new type for Saami lexicography, as they
bring to the forefront the epistemological function of a dictionary, which is due to the specificity of
its user, who is the bearer of the Saami culture but has no command of the Saami language. It
discusses the specific character of the word list and definitions of the Kola Saami language
dictionary, and the principles of making such dictionaries (word selection, thematic belonging,
specificity). It is shown that the word list of such dictionaries reflects the linguistic world image of
indigenous small-numbered people and that its definitions include a culturological commentary
commensurate with people’s understanding of the world around them, their living practices and
their everyday life experiences. It is also shown that the dictionaries of the Kola Saami language
do not fit the exact traditional classification of dictionaries: in this case the distinctions between
linguistic/encyclopaedic and linguo culturological/linguistic country-related is blurred.
Keywords: lexicography, dictionary, culture, indigenous small-numbered people of the north,
saami language.
GJHSS-G Classification : FOR Code: 380201, 200405
DictionaryandCultureTheoryandPracticeoftheKolaSaamiDictionaryMaking
Strictly as per the compliance and regulations of:
© 2014. Ivanishcheva Olga. This is a research/review paper, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons AttributionNoncommercial 3.0 Unported License http:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/), permitting all non-commercial use,
distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Dictionary and Culture: Theory and Practice of
the Kola Saami Dictionary Making
Keywords: lexicography, dictionary, culture, indigenous
small-numbered people of the north, saami language.
O
I.
Introduction
Author: Murmansk State Humanities University.
e-mail: [email protected]
© 2014 Global Journals Inc. (US)
15
-
ne of the remarkable tendencies of
contemporary lexicography is to address the
dictionary user. Taking the user’s needs,
interests and experience into account are also
requirements of contemporary linguistics in general. This
tendency for anthropocentric development of scientific
ideas suggests addressing the human being as the
speaker of a language and bearer of a culture. The idea
that “it is impossible to learn the language alone without
going beyond it, without resorting to its creator, speaker,
user – to the human being, to the certain linguistic
identity” (Karaulov, 2002, p.7) becomes especially
significant in practical lexicography and means
lexicography theory researchers must address the issue
of “dictionary and culture”. This issue becomes
extremely urgent for dictionaries of languages of
indigenous small-numbered peoples and dying
languages in particular, such as the language of the
Kola Saami.
The Saami are an indigenous small-numbered
people of the North that have been divided historically
and now live in four countries: Russia, Finland, Norway
and Sweden. The Saami of Russia (the Kola Saami) live
mainly on the Kola Peninsula which accommodates the
administrative unit of the Murmansk Region. The
language of the Kola Saami (the Kola Saami language)
has four dialects, which are treated by foreign linguists
as separate languages: Kildin, Ter, Akkala and Skolt
Saami. The Kildin dialect is most widespread.
According to the 2010 Russian population
census data (Russian Population Census, 2010) there
are 1771 Saami in Russia (urban population – 787, rural
population – 984), of whom 1599 live in the Murmansk
region. The traditional Saami trades are reindeer
husbandry, hunting, fishing and foraging (Volkov, 1996,
p.11; Lukjanchenko, 2003, p.19; Chernyakov, 1998,
p.52). It is reindeer husbandry that lies at the root of the
ethnographic originality of the Saami (Volkov, 2007,
p.46). Analysis of the contemporary sociolinguistic
situation shows that the Kola Saami language is critically
endangered and this threat is connected to the Saami’s
breaking away from traditional trades and ways of life,
their dispersed living, the lack of educational
opportunities, the low demand for use of the Kola Saami
language by the Saami and the long-term impact of the
Russian language. Besides that, the Kola Saami did not
have a writing system for a long time. With the language
as the guardian of the spiritual and material culture, the
Saami may lose the knowledge of this culture as well as
the language itself.
The Kola Saami lexicography is represented by
only two interlingual dictionaries: the Saami–Russian
Dictionary (Afanasjeva et al., 1985) and a Saami–
Russian and Russian–Saami Dictionary by G.M. Kert
(1986). Kert’s dictionary contains about 4000 entries and
is intended for primary school children. The author’s aim
is that students using this interlingual learner’s dictionary
should successfully master the native (Kola Saami) and
Russian languages. The dictionary edited by Afanasjeva
et al. contains 8000 entries and is intended for
specialists in Finno-Ugric languages, ethnography and
others interested in the Saami language. There is also a
dictionary developed by the Saami language technology
centre, Giellatekno, at the University of Tromsø, Norway
(University of Tromsø, 2010). However this has been
developed on the basis of the dictionaries of Kert (Kert,
1986) and Kuruch (Afanasjeva et al., 1985).
Nevertheless, the preservation of the Kola
Saami language is, to a large extent, connected with the
description and lexicographical recording of the Saami
Year
process of making dictionaries of the spiritual and material
culture lexis of an indigenous small-numbered people of the
North – the Saami. The article shows that such dictionaries are
of a new type for Saami lexicography, as they bring to the
forefront the epistemological function of a dictionary, which is
due to the specificity of its user, who is the bearer of the Saami
culture but has no command of the Saami language. It
discusses the specific character of the word list and definitions
of the Kola Saami language dictionary, and the principles of
making such dictionaries (word selection, thematic belonging,
specificity). It is shown that the word list of such dictionaries
reflects the linguistic world image of indigenous smallnumbered people and that its definitions include a
culturological commentary commensurate with people’s
understanding of the world around them, their living practices
and their everyday life experiences. It is also shown that the
dictionaries of the Kola Saami language do not fit the exact
traditional classification of dictionaries: in this case the
distinctions between linguistic/encyclopaedic and linguo
culturological/linguistic country-related is blurred.
Global Journal of Human Social Science ( G ) Volume XIV Issue VII Version I
Abstract- This paper reports theoretical results obtained in the
2014
Ivanishcheva Olga
Year
2014
Dictionary and Culture: Theory and Practice of the Kola Saami Dictionary Making
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Global Journal of Human Social Science ( G ) Volume XIV Issue VII Version I
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vocabulary which, in its turn, will contribute to the
recovery of the Saami community. Availability of two
interlingual dictionaries cannot resolve this problem to
the full. In our opinion another type of Kola Saami
language dictionary must be designed.
The aim of this paper is to summarize the
theoretical results available from the work on
development of dictionaries of the spiritual and material
culture lexis of the indigenous small-numbered people
of the North and define the specific character of the
dictionary of spiritual and material culture of the dying
language of the Saami.
My research was motivated by the following
questions: how does the type of a dictionary depend on
the user? what is peculiar about the user of a dictionary
of a dying language (with a case study of the Kola
Saami language)? what is the peculiarity of the word list
and definitions of such a dictionary? what type is a
dictionary of a dying language?
II.
Resources and Techniques
The methodological basis of this research is the
anthropocentric approach (Karaulov, 2002; Kubryakova,
1995; Stepanov, 2001a) and the notion of
anthropocentric lexicography (Morkovkin, 1990) with is
orientation towards users’ interests (Berkov, 2004).
Being of current interest to contemporary practical
lexicography, the orientation towards the user of the
dictionary is theoretically based on addressing his
cognitive base. The research methods used in the
present work are the descriptive method and definitions’
analysis.
III.
Results
a) Cognitive-and-Communicative
Classification of Dictionaries
Approach
to
Contemporary lexicography has turned to the
user. Prof. V.P. Berkov points to two principles in
working with an interlingual dictionary: maximum
information using minimum space, without any harm to
the user’s interests, and maximum account of user’s
interests (Berkov, 2003, p.13). It is not by chance that
the typology of a dictionary is sometimes connected
with the types of query made by users.
Our analysis of 145 native and foreign
dictionaries showed that if the dictionaries are classified
based on the principle of taking account of the user’s
knowledge level and his queries, we can speak of a
cognitive-and-communicative
approach
to
the
classification of dictionaries.
We think that the traditional division of
dictionaries into linguistic and encyclopaedic must be
seen more widely – as a division into linguistic and nonlinguistic. As is known, an encyclopaedic dictionary
gives a full description of items and phenomena and
explains their structure and purpose. Linguistic
© 2014 Global Journals Inc. (US)
dictionaries provide information about words, i.e. about
their meanings and usage. The notion of ‘non-linguistic
dictionaries’ is not only wider in scope than that of
‘encyclopaedic dictionaries’, but uses a fundamentally
different basis for division.
Division of dictionaries into linguistic and nonlinguistic can be based on form/content characteristic,
where the form is a word in the aggregate of its
grammatical characteristics, and the content is the
meaning and sense of this word.According to
Y.S. Stepanov, “the sense of a word – is an item or items
which this word is correctly used for in accordance with
the standards of a certain language and a concept is a
meaning of a word” (Stepanov, 2001b, p.44). If an item
(realia) is an element of material culture, then a concept
is an element of spiritual culture. A concept as an
element of spiritual culture is an object of culturological
dictionaries. A realia as an element of material culture
can be an object of culturological, country-specific and
encyclopaedic dictionaries.
For linguistic and non-linguistic dictionaries in
their turn the orientation towards availability/lack of
language speaker’s/culture bearer’s knowledge can
serve as the basis for further division (where the user is
a non-specialist).
Thus, linguistic dictionaries depending on the
user being/not being the speaker/culture bearer are
represented by monolingual and bilingual types.
Monolingual dictionaries (dictionaries of definitions,
collocations, synonyms etc.) are intended for users who
are speakers/bearers of the culture and aimed at
satisfying their need to deepen their current knowledge
of a word. Bilingual dictionaries satisfy the need of a
user who is not a speaker/culture bearer to attain such
knowledge.
Non-linguistic dictionaries are also grouped
depending on their orientation towards a user:
encyclopaedic and culturological dictionaries are
oriented towards the knowledge of a speaker/culture
bearer, and cross-cultural dictionaries are oriented
towards the knowledge of a non-speaker/non-culture
bearer.
The dictionary’s classification is defined by the
criteria for inclusion of words in the words list and
information in the dictionary entry.
A country-specific dictionary differs from an
encyclopaedic dictionary in the description object: in an
encyclopaedic dictionary it references notions and
personalia from all fields of knowledge including the
humanities (history, sociology, ethnography, religion,
arts), independent of belonging to one or another
culture, one or another nation, whereas the description
object of a country-specific dictionary includes only
notions and personalia belonging to one and the same
country, culture, nation. A linguistic country-specific
dictionary combines the features of different
dictionaries:
linguistic
(definition,
translation,
IV.
Present-Day Functions of
Dictionaries
It is often said that a dictionary plays a huge
role in people’s spiritual culture. Dictionaries have
different social functions: informative, communicative
and normative (Gak, 1990, p.462). The main purpose of
a dictionary of any type is as a didactic work, to
eliminate the discrepancy between individual knowledge
and the knowledge of all the community (Bondarko et
al., 1996, p.309). The history of dictionary making shows
that it was the informative function that prevailed in the
first dictionaries: glossaries explained words which were
unclear to the reader. The normative function of
dictionaries became prominent later on. The
communicative function which is common to all
dictionaries – monolingual and bilingual – has become
especially significant over recent decades in connection
with the development of linguistic country-specific
lexicography. These dictionaries play an important part
in cross-cultural communication as they represent not
only the facts of material culture, but also the ‘current
linguistic consciousness’ and the values system of
language speakers.
It would be difficult to overestimate the role of a
bilingual dictionary in learning a foreign culture. As is
known, the purpose of a bilingual dictionary is to
respond to the need to create and understand texts in a
foreign language. In connection with this, the essence
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Global Journal of Human Social Science ( G ) Volume XIV Issue VII Version I
encyclopaedic information is emphasized in these
dictionaries, along with the identification of the semantic
potential of a word, accumulating cultural memory.
Culturological dictionaries vary in form, including both
reference books prepared by historians and
ethnographers of the 19th century and dictionaries of
everyday
life
and
culture
compiled
today.
Linguoculturological dictionaries are limited to the
publications of contemporary authors. They include the
Orthodox
Church
Culture
Dictionary
by
G.N. Sklyarevskaya (2000), Dictionary of the Russian
Culture by 2001b Y.S. Stepanov, Dictionary of the 20th
Century Culture by V.P. Rudnev (2003), etc.
The analysis showed that, unlike countryspecific dictionaries, culturological dictionaries are
oriented towards the knowledge of the user/speaker of
the language and may employ realia and concepts as
objects for lexicographic recording.
Culturological dictionaries of concepts are
represented in Russian linguistics by Stepanov’s
Constants: Dictionary of the Russian Culture (2001b).
The realia dictionaries are objects of material culture.
Culturological dictionaries of realia satisfy the need of
the language speaker to deepen his current knowledge,
as do encyclopaedic dictionaries, but they differ from
encyclopaedic dictionaries by having a thematic
arrangement of material.
-
terminology) and non-linguistic (in this case, countryspecific), and its author has the role of a medium
between two sociocultural communities.
Thus, the purpose of linguistic country-specific
dictionaries is the introduction to the culture of a country
by means of describing the meanings of lexical and
phraseological units, and their addressee is the learner
of a language.
A dictionary of culture or a culturological
dictionary can stand for both an encyclopaedic
dictionary (in case of different countries) and a countryspecific dictionary (in case of one country).
There is no single understanding in
lexicography of what a culturological dictionary is. In
foreign lexicography there is a dictionary type called a
cultural dictionary which is a general term for reference
works which can be both the result of a cultural practice
and the agents of its promotion (Hartmann & James,
1998, p.50). The authors of the Dictionary of
Lexicography, R.R.K. Hartmann and G. James, have a
wide understanding of the term culturological dictionary.
In their opinion, culturological dictionaries include the
Longman Dictionary of English Language and Culture
which is intended, as the authors say, “…to help
students of English to understand the words and
phrases that make up the complex fabric of Englishspeaking life and culture” (Longman Dictionary of
English Language and Culture , 1992). To this effect the
body of each entry includes Cultural Notes, which
“give[s] detailed information about the associations that
words have for native speakers of English” (Longman
Dictionary of English Language and Culture, 1992). This
is a therefore a culturological dictionary of a countryspecific type intended for non-speakers (language
learners).
Alongside the Longman Dictionary of English
Language and Culture, The Dictionary of Cultural
Literacy (Hirsch et al., 1988) is also classified as
culturological. It is based on the principle of of being
usable by an American with limited cultural literacy and
provides information about realia of different countries. It
is a culturological dictionary of the encyclopaedic type,
intended for language speakers and records all the
information required to be considered conversant with
the culture of America.
The term ‘linguoculturological dictionary’, which
has appeared lately in Russian course books, differs
slightly in content from the term ‘culturological
dictionary’. If “culturological dictionaries [they] mean
dictionaries and reference books dealing with specific
phenomena of material and spiritual culture as well as
corresponding realia and concepts seen in development
and change” (Shimchuyk, 2003, p.198), then
linguoculturological dictionaries are defined as being the
result of the integration of knowledge from various fields
of humanities, presenting cultural phenomena content in
a
lexicographical
form.
The
importance
of
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and functions of a contemporary bilingual translation
dictionary can be re-examined. The function cannot be
limited to the communicative, even if its essence is seen
as providing the reader with the required words in native
or foreign language. A bilingual dictionary gives the user
an opportunity not only to get information about the
vocabulary and grammar of another language, but also
to become familiar with another culture through the
system of verbalized notions, and therefore gain access
to the reflection of objective reality by the language, and
the results of human cognitive activity in this particular
cultural community.
In this regard one can consider a bilingual
translation dictionary as having a special ontological
essence.
Furthermore, a bilingual dictionary as a tool of
translation must respond to the need for communication
between people separated by a linguo-ethnic barrier by
which the authors mean those who not only lack a
common language, but also have different national
cultures. In this regard one can also consider a bilingual
translation dictionary as having a special gnoseological
function. The gnoseological aspect of lexicography as a
scientific discipline is seen by B.Y. Gorodetskij in the
essence of a dictionary being a way to organize and
present the knowledge accumulated by the society
(Gorodetskij, 1983, p.9).
V.
Dictionaries of Spiritual and
Material Culture Lexis of the
Kola Saami as Dictionaries of a
New Type for the Saami
Lexicography
The Saami Language Lab of the Murmansk
State Humanities University (Murmansk, Russia) has
published dictionaries of the Saami spiritual culture lexis
and the Saami traditional trades and husbandry lexis
(Dictionary of Spiritual Culture Lexis, 2013; Dictionary of
Kola Saami Traditional Trades and Husbandry Lexis,
2014). A wildlife lexis dictionary is currently being
prepared for publication. The experience gained during
the design of these dictionaries allows us to draw some
theoretical conclusions.
These dictionaries of spiritual and material
culture fulfil the primary task of our research – recording
the present state of the Saami language in the speech
community. As such, the dictionary exercises a very
important function – preservation of traditional worldview
components, which carry main life essences of the
northern ethnos. The way in which indigenous smallnumbered peoples live is mainly determined by three
factors: natural conditions, type of displacement and
type of economy, the two latter of which define the
culture type. This knowledge reflects a more archaic,
fundamental attitude of humanity to the world from the
viewpoint of sense and utilitarian values of folk culture.
© 2014 Global Journals Inc. (US)
Our dictionaries are translation (bilingual)
dictionaries; i.e. for an original word in the Saami
language they contain a dictionary entry with a
translated equivalent which is most often a description.
But the main attention in the dictionaries is paid not to
the grammatical characteristics of a word but to a
culturological
commentary
which
reflects
the
background knowledge of a speaker. So, for example:
вуэннч куск кыппта – a piece of boiled meat
(AA). Just like ancient Lappish women, in the 19th
century the Saami habituated babies to the reindeer
meat by putting a piece of meat onto the lips of a baby
so that the baby could suck the meat juice out.
Sometimes such training started half a year after a
baby’s birth, sometimes later (Haruzin, 1890, p.311).
Children were also fed the best pieces of adult meals:
reindeer bone marrow, fish viscera etc. (Volkov, 1939,
p.56). A breastfed child was given a piece of reindeer
meat to suck. Thus, babies were habituated to meat
from the cradle.
(Lukjanchenko, 2003, p.63); нюввт – national
meal made of boiled fish and cloudberry (Kert, 1986,
p.65). Freshly boiled whitefish are salted a little, filleted,
mixed with ripe cloudberries and dressed with fish oil –
and the salad is ready (Bolshakova, 2005, p.156).
Mixture of fish with cloudberries (луэм неут) (Volkov,
1939, p.47).
As can be seen from the examples, the
definitions in our dictionaries are typical for a bilingual
dictionary which adds culturological commentary to the
translated equivalent. Compare this to an example from
Hausa-Russian dictionary:
abokin wasa – ‘friend in play’ (so-called ‘joke
kinship’. At New Year the ‘friends in play’ give presents
to each other. Residents of one city give presents to
residents of another, representatives of one trade give
presents to representatives of another). (Olderogge,
1954)
Therefore our dictionaries are translation
(bilingual) in form, but their content makes them different
from conventional translation dictionaries.
I see the main purpose of our dictionaries as
preservation of unique aspects of culture and language
in the relevant part of the culture of indigenous smallnumbered people. This is why the starting point for us in
the dictionary is a notion (concept), not a word.
The path from a concept to a word lies at the
root of ideographical dictionaries. Ideological (i.e.
ideographical) dictionaries are dictionaries which fully or
partially use the principle of classification of speech acts
(for instance, pity is included under altruistic feelings¸
which itself is included under feelings in general, which
in their turn are included in the category mental
phenomena). Thus the basic principle of classification of
non-abstract words, according to Charles Bally, is the
allocation of words to topic sections (Bally, 2001: 151–
155). In the opinion of Y.N. Karaulov, the structure of
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Global Journal of Human Social Science ( G ) Volume XIV Issue VII Version I
bearer of the Saami culture, in most cases does not
know the Saami language. According to E. Scheller, a
researcher from the University of Tromsø (Norway), out
of 700 ethnos representatives who have knowledge of
the Kildin dialect of the Saami language on different
levels, over 200 are potential speakers who have good
passive knowledge of the language: they understand
everything, or pretty much everything, and many can
speak the Kildin dialect, but for various reasons speak
inactively or do not speak at all. About 100 of the 700
are active speakers, who speak the Kildin dialect fluently
and use it on all levels (Scheller, 2010, p.15–17).
The definitions in the dictionaries of languages
of indigenous small-numbered peoples reflect an
ordinary level of cognition. The basis of an ordinary level
of cognition is everybody’s direct personal experience,
which is why this kind of cognition is more individualized
than scientific cognition. But such an approach has
advantages in the variety of solutions and breadth of
search. The building of a dictionary of the Kola Saami
language reflects such an experience: in the absence of
a live speaking environment, restraints on the use of the
language in private and public life, the senior age of
active speakers, separation of speakers from the
language habitat – material and spiritual culture – it is
natural to turn to the cognitive, not to the communicative
essence of the background knowledge. This is why
typical ways of finding out the background knowledge of
a language speaker (interviews, analysis of definitions in
various types of dictionaries and texts of fiction and
journalism) cannot be used in full. In such a situation, a
researcher must record all the knowledge of a language
speaker making no difference between personal and
social. The language speaker relating his personal
experience presents the typical and usual because the
social environment in which the informant grew up is the
only record of such knowledge.
Our field studies of the Kola Saami language
showed how different the realia knowledge of different
speakers can be. The comparison of field data with
definitions in dictionaries of the Kola Saami language by
Kert (Kert, 1986) and Kuruch (Afanasjeva et al., 1985)
revealed some inconsistency in the age limits which
define the name of a deer. Compare: вундел – reindeer
doe of two years (YA) and вуннял – reindeer doe of
three years(YA), воджемь – young reindeer doe of three
to four years (YA) and ваджь – reindeer doe of three to
six years, fawned once (Kert, 2003, p.54), важь –
reindeer doe (three-year-old reindeer doe after first
fawning)(Afanasjeva et al., 1985). This inconsistency
cannot be explained yet.
By considering the principles for lexicographical
recording in the dictionaries of spiritual and material
culture of the Kola Saami, we can understand the
principles for word selection and dictionary entry
development.
-
ideographic dictionaries identifies components of the
world image, though the ideological position of the
author makes impact on the relations hierarchy
(Karaulov, 1976, p.249–259).
Our dictionaries of the Kola Saami language
follow the topical principle. Thus the Dictionary of the
Kola Saami Spiritual Culture Lexis (Ivanishcheva &
Bakula, 2013) includes the following vocabulary topics:
Religious Faiths, Life Cycle Ordinances, Folklife Arts,
and Festivities. In the Dictionary of the Kola Saami
Traditional Trades and Husbandry Lexis (Ivanishcheva &
Ershtadt, 2014) the vocabulary is arranged in six topics:
Reindeer Husbandry, Fishing, Hunting, Foraging, Sheep
Husbandry, Zootomy and Zoophysics. These topics
include subtopics, sections and subsections. For
instance, Reindeer Husbandry contains the following
subtopics: Domestic Reindeer, Reindeer Herders and
Unions of Reindeer Herders, Reindeer Herders’ Gear,
Reindeer Distinguishing Marks, Reindeer-Herding Dogs,
Places and Structures for Herding, Keeping, Counting
and Culling of Reindeer, Reindeer Harness and Sledge,
Reindeer Pack Load, Reindeer Slaughter and Reindeer
Skin Treatment. The subtopic DomesticReindeer
includes such sections as Reindeer Buck, Reindeer
Doe, Reindeer Fawn, Reindeer by Household Use,
Reindeer by Position in a Team, Reindeer by Having
/Not Having Antlers, etc. The Reindeer Fawn section
includes the subsections Reindeer Fawn from Birth to
Three Months, Reindeer Fawn from Three to Six Months,
Reindeer Fawn from Six to Eighteen Months.
Our practice of making dictionaries of the Kola
Saami language reveals the inadequacy of the position
of strict division of dictionaries into linguistic and
encyclopaedic, and makes
it necessary
to
fundamentally reconsider the principles for linguistic
dictionary entry design.
Our experience showed that dictionaries of a
dying language have their own specificity which lies in
their users, word lists and definitions.
What kind of user is a dying language dictionary
made for? The theory of lexicography makes a
distinction between active and passive dictionaries. For
L.V. Shcherba, for instance, it was evident that for each
pair of languages two pairs of explanatory (defining)
dictionaries are needed – for Russian with explanations
in Russian language and for foreigners in their
corresponding languages. These four dictionaries for
each pair of languages would give in the opinion of
L.V. Shcherba an opportunity to read and understand
foreign books and get to know the real faces of foreign
words (Shcherba, 1993, p.7). The division of bilingual
dictionaries into active (Russian–foreign for a Russian
user, for instance) and passive (foreign–Russian for a
Russian user) types define their tasks.
If a Kola Saami dictionary is bilingual its user
must know at least one of the languages – Russian or
Kola Saami. But the user of such a dictionary, even if a
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Word selection principles. Selection of words for
different types of dictionaries is done on different
grounds and quite often turns into a very difficult task.
Each dictionary compiler faces the question of which
objective criteria to use for such selection. The criteria
are defined by the needs of a user. The purpose of
these dictionaries is to record the spiritual and material
culture of the Saami through description of lexical units
of the Kildin dialect of the Saami language.
Consequently, the selection of words to the word list of
such a dictionary will be based on the principles of
specificity and thematic belonging.
Principle of thematic belonging means that the
group will include words of which the lexical meaning
includes a semantic component of this topic. For
instance, in “почень – a belt of special construction and
shape, which was used in sorcery and healing the sick”,
the component “used in sorcery and healing the sick” is
thematically connected with the group of words
Religious Faith Vocabulary as is the component “the
most important tool of hunting magic” in the following
example: “чуэрвь-гарты – antlers of a wild reindeer, the
most important tool of hunting magic in the period
preceding the taming of the wild deer”. The component
“for control of the reindeer team” allows allocating the
word “харя – gee-pole (a pole about 3 m long and 3–4
cm in diameter for control of the reindeer team)” to the
group Harness and Sledge Reindeer Raising and the
component “skin from reindeer limb” is the ground for
allocation of word “коаммас – reindeer limb skin” to the
group Reindeer Skin Treatment. The word “воаӆӆк – a
device for ice fishing: a long narrow plank with one end
sharpened and the other end having a hole for the net
rope; the plank is pushed from one ice hole to another
and thus pulls the net)” belongs to the Ice Fishing
group.
The specificity principle means that the word list
of these dictionaries must include the words which are
specific to this particular ethnos. For instance, in our
materials, such specificity lies with the religious words
relating to a pre-Christian faith. The Saami used to
worship the sieidi, sacred stones which, according to
the Saami beliefs, housed a spirit. The reindeer
husbandry vocabulary is also specific to the Saami
culture. The characteristic traits of the Saami reindeer
husbandry include, for instance, use of a boat-shaped
sledge with a single sledge runner called кēресь and
wooden reindeer pack saddle called вāгк. However the
specificity of a realia does not always mean that it is
unique to this particular culture. In lexicography theory
there are different views on this issue. Thus, the
afterword in the linguistic country-specific dictionary
France: Linguistic Cross-Cultural Dictionary (Vedenina,
1997) the realias presented in this dictionary are
grouped as follows: (1) realia present in the French
culture, but absent in the Russian culture; (2) realia
present in both cultures, but different by a certain
© 2014 Global Journals Inc. (US)
attribute (from the viewpoint of organization, function
etc.); (3) realias having an international character but still
different in national content (Vedenina, 1997, p.1029–
1030). Analysis of the word list in France shows that,
contrary to the conventional idea of a linguistic countryspecific dictionary, the realias presented here differ in
the national specificity degree. It is certainly quite
difficult to speak of specificity of national images, as it
requires quite a wide research of various cultures.
It seemed reasonable to introduce to the word
list of the Dictionary of the Spiritual Culture of the Kola
Saami the words belonging to the Christian Belief
Vocabulary group. Although the Kola Saami accepted
Christianity, it is not their original religion which means it
is difficult to speak of a specific Christian religious
vocabulary of the Saami. Nevertheless it is a part of the
spiritual culture of the indigenous people of the North,
which is a unique arctic culture and so any element of it
must inherently contain a unique component, including
the linguistic. For instance, the names of the creator –
the God (Осподт, Иммель).
A special group of culturally connoted lexes are
personal names. Many names in the Saami culture have
a background potential: among these are personal
names connected with pre-Christian beliefs (Мяндаш,
Мяндаш-пырре,
Мяндаш-вежа,
Мяндаш-каб,
Мяндаш-парнь, Конньт-акка, Луот-хозик, Разиайке,
Рухтнас, Каврай, Тиирьмесь, Аккрува, Мец-хозяин,
Пырт-хозяин) and names of feasts (Сāмь пēййв ―
The Saami Day, 6 February; Сāмь сань пēййв – The
Saami Word Day, 24 May; Пудзэ ляшкант – a reindeer
herding feast connected with the oestrus period).
Principles of dictionary entry build-up. Inclusion
of cultural information in the Kola Saami dictionary
requires not only the selection of a lexis into the word
list, but also a special presentation of the entry in the
form of a culturological commentary to a translated
equivalent.
The challenge of presenting cultural information
in a dictionary of any type is compounded by, among
other things, uncertainty about the issue of the essence
and structure of a dictionary entry. Dictionary definitions
(descriptive,
synonymic,
antonymic,
functional,
transformational, referential, etc.) as a way of presenting
the structure of lexical meaning, and the types of word
interpretation (definition, illustrative example, graphical
illustrations, etymological references and translation of a
foreign word) as techniques of this interpretation are
discussed in linguistic research works (see, for instance,
Zgusta, 1971). We are interested not in the definition
type by form (they have been studied in sufficient detail),
but in the content of a definition. By content of a
definition we mean a set of characteristics of an
item/notion. The linguistic literature primarily discusses
the principles for selection of characteristics in terms of
relevance, sufficiency, and fullness. As is known, the
place of additional information in a dictionary can vary: it
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the destiny of the sick person (Shatkov 1911, p.487–
488).
Such a commentary includes a description of
the realia – its physical appearance (“a belt that
resembled a drum … three copper rings”), its function
(“a Lappish sorcerer put the belt on and prophesy or
cured the sick wearing it”), ritual description (“for curing
the belt was three times carried around the lower back
of the sick person but never put onto him …”).
Commentary to the word чуэрвь-гарты
includes a linguistic commentary (“чуэррьв (чуэрьв) –
‘antler’ (Afanasjeva et al., 1985, p.407; Kert, 1986,
p.109); the word ‘гарты’ might have Russian
pronunciation, in the Kola Saami there is a word гоаррь
(гоарь) – ‘side, towards somebody or something, after’
(Afanasjeva et al., 1985, p.75; Kert, 1986, p.28); the
meaning of the word might be ‘in the direction of the
antlers, after the antlers’”), going into a culturological
commentary (“it is used in the following way in sorcery:
having chosen a spot in the hunting area belonging to a
village the hunter used to bring the antlers of the
reindeer killed by him and put them into two parallel
rows so that the antlers would stand as if they were worn
by reindeer running after one another. It was kind of
showing the way to wild herds, which were supposed to
follow the antlers and become tame. A frontal bone with
an antler from the чуэррьв-гарта of a son-in-law
brought away by his father-in-law resulted in the
relocation of wild reindeer herds after the bone (see
Volkov, 1996, p.73)”).
The dictionary of the traditional trades includes
the words of material culture, so the commentary
contains the description of realia connected with the
traditional trades of the Kola Saami. For instance, the
commentary to the name for a net for sea fishing of
salmon – лӯсс хāррьв:
the most common fishing gear was a special
kind of stake net – large-meshed nets, which were made
of thick store-bought thread and dyed red with alder or
birch bark in the same way as other fishing nets. They
differed from conventional fishing nets by having a
larger size and larger mesh (5 x 5 cm and more – up to
10 x 10 cm). They were usually 20–30 m long and about
4 m high. They were usually set across the tide of a river
and attached to poles pitched in the river bed. The fish
going upstream to breed were caught in these nets
(although it was not only large fish that got caught).
These nets were examined every 6 hours because the
fish went off if they remained in the net over a longer
period of time (Lukjanchenko, 1971, p.40).
The characteristics of the realia described in the
commentary are its physical appearance (“largemeshed nets … up to 10 x 10 cm”), mode of application
(“they were usually set across the tide of a river and
attached to poles pitched to the river bed”) and principle
of operation (“the fish going upstream to breed … (…
although it was not only large fish that got caught)”).
-
may be detached, in a special area and included in a
commentary, or it may be used as a descriptive element
in the interpretation. There are no criteria defining the
location of such information, which is why this location in
the dictionaries is decided by the author’s intuition. It is
often difficult to draw a line between interpretation of the
lexical meaning of a word and additional information
about a realia that is a part of the commentary. If the
information about a word can be considered a linguistic
commentary, then the information about a notion/realia,
in our opinion, can be included into a commentary
which may be of two types: actual and culturological.
An actual commentary corresponds to the level
of description of a scientific notion (element, process,
historic fact, biological entity, public life fact etc.). It is
characterized
by
objectivism,
accuracy
and
concreteness. Strong examples of scientific notion
descriptions are the definitions attached to terms in a
special dictionary as well as those in an encyclopaedic
or a definition dictionary. The characteristics of an item
actualized in this kind of commentary most often match
its characteristics as presented in an encyclopaedic
dictionary.
A culturological commentary differs from an
actual commentary by making available information
which concerns the speaker (not a natural function of an
item, but in relation to a human being, use by a human
being, application in human practice, etc., that is the
role of an item in cultural life).
Commentary content is determined by several
factors including the type of lexis, dictionary purpose
and, for a bilingual dictionary, the difference of cultures
as well.
The Dictionary of the Kola Saami Spiritual
Culture Lexis contains words of spiritual culture, which is
why the commentary begins with the descriptions of
traditions, customs and rituals. See, for instance, the
commentary to the word почень:
a belt that resembled a drum when it lay on a
flat surface and was folded. This kind of belt was made
of a black leather strap, as long as the circumference of
an average man’s waist and about ¼ arshin [18cm]
wide; on the outside it was sheathed with woollen bands
of three colours: the upper band was yellow, the middle
was the favourite Saami colour – red; the lower was
black; the bands were beaded with different colours; on
the inner side there were three copper rings. During
rituals a Lappish sorcerer put the belt on and
prophesied or cured the sick wearing it. For curing, the
belt was carried three times around the lower back of
the sick person but never put onto him. After the last
round the sick person patted the sorcerer’s back with
the palm of his right hand three times and said: “May
your eyes be clear and your feet be strong so that you
can help me better”. The sorcerer replied: “You will know
all tomorrow.” The sorcerer would put the belt on before
going to sleep and that night he was supposed to see
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The set of characteristics of a realia described
to to the user is often defined by the type of dictionary.
Introducing the reader to the culture of another country
is the task of country-specific (linguistic country-specific)
dictionaries; to transfer the richness and unique
character of native culture is the task of culturological
(linguoculturological) dictionaries; being a universal
reference book is the purpose of encyclopaedic
dictionaries.
In view of the foregoing, the dictionaries of
spiritual and material culture of the Kola Saami culture
belong to can be considered as being of mixed type –
linguistic, culturological and country-specific. On the
one hand, the dictionaries describe a culture which is
alien to a Russian-speaking user, but most often they
present information which is unknown to even the Saami
culture bearer. On the other hand, the dictionaries are
also intended for the Saami user who has no command
of the language of his ethnos. This is what makes
specific the dictionaries of the indigenous smallnumbered people, whose language belongs to the
group of critically endangered languages.
VI.
Conclusions
Dictionaries of indigenous small-numbered
people are unique compositions in the case of dying
languages. From my experience of compiling
dictionaries of the spiritual and material culture lexis of
the Kola Saami, I think that in such dictionaries the line
between a linguistic and an encyclopaedic dictionary is
erased and the function of the dictionary is
fundamentally changed. It is the gnoseological function
that comes to the fore, because of the specificity of the
user of such a dictionary who does not fit into the
categories accepted in traditional lexicography of being
a culture bearer or not being a speaker of the language.
It is also the content of the dictionary of the Kola Saami
language, both the word list and the content of the
definitions, that makes it specific. The word list reflects
the linguistic world image of the indigenous smallnumbered people, which represents people’s way of
living and image of their culture. The contents of a
definition in such a dictionary represent the background
knowledge of a cast of Saami language speakers and
culture bearers. At the forefront is the orientation
towards recording the cumulative function of a
language, which ensures the accumulation and storage
of the verbalized experience of the spiritual and material
culture life of people, and it resorts to the cognitive, not
the communicative, essence of background knowledge
that is natural. The definition therefore represents a
comprehensive culturological commentary which meets
the level of the usual perception of the surrounding
world by indigenous small-numbered people. So the
dictionaries of spiritual and material culture of the Kola
Saami do not fit the strict frames of conventional
© 2014 Global Journals Inc. (US)
classifications of dictionaries: the distinction between
linguistic/encyclopaedic
and
linguoculturological/
linguistic country-specific is blurred in the case of
dictionaries of dying languages.
VII.
Acknowledgements
The research is being carried out under the
aegis of the Ministry of Education and Science of the
Russian Federation in 2014–2016 (project 545).
I would like to thank my colleagues, students,
and the Kildin Saami native speakers, as well as the
representatives of the Kola Saami peoples who helped
me with collecting the Kildin Saami language material,
gave interviews, and answered questionnaires and polls.
I am grateful to Professor Georgij Kert and
especially grateful to the teacher of the Kildin Saami
language, the Saami activist Alexandra Antonova, who
agreed to take part in all of our projects.
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21. List of informants’ acronyms:
22. AA – Alexandra Andreevna Antonova, born in 1932,
living in the village of Lovozero (born in Teriberka
settlement), Kildin Saami speaker.
23. YA – Anna Nikolaevna Yurjeva, born in 1934, living in
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Kildin Saami speaker.
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